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Not so fast, experts warn about Gardiner demolition

Waterfront Toronto’s study doesn’t value the needs of commuters enough, some observers say, while others would go even further.

Old supports are all that remain of the former Gardiner stub west of the DVP, which was removed a decade ago. Traffic now moves easily along a Lake Shore Blvd. area exposed to sunlight, with biking and walking trails alongside. (CARLOS OSORIO / TORONTO STAR) | Order this photo

A city and Waterfront Toronto report released Wednesday ranked four options for the eastern stretch: maintaining it, improving it, replacing it, or removing it. Removing the roadway ranked highest in a number of areas — from benefits to cyclists and pedestrians, to social and environmental concerns.

But removal was found to be the absolute worst option for drivers, adding at least 10 minutes to commuter times.

And that’s the category that counts most, says Murtaza Haider, a Ryerson University transportation expert.

“Are we doing this to improve accessibility and mobility in Toronto? Are we doing this to reduce gridlock? Or are we doing this for all the factors they listed?” Haider wonders.

Haider, who attended the city hall briefing Wednesday, questioned a diagram that gave equal weight to categories such as urban design and the environment. He said the two categories where removal ranked lowest — “automobiles” and “movement of goods” — are the most important in the debate.

“The remove option is going to increase travel times in the city and also in the corridors which will be directly affected by it,” he said. “That is certain.”

Tearing down the Gardiner would also increase travel times for people taking public transit, Haider said. If even 15 per cent of drivers on the Gardiner switched to transit, Toronto’s already maxed-out transit system would buckle under the pressure, he said.

He said the city should focus on improving public transit before it considers removing that stretch of Gardiner. Until then, the focus should be on maintaining the crumbling expressway for the drivers who desperately need it, he said.

Baher Abdulhai, a civil engineer at the University of Toronto, said that demolition was clearly better from a land use perspective, but worse from a traffic perspective.

“Which is the lesser of two evils: losing the opportunity of better land use or adding to the existing traffic nightmare?” he asked. “If downtown Toronto is the heart of the GTA, the Gardiner Expressway is the aorta. I am having hard time envisioning Toronto without an aorta.”

One option he suggested was to bury the expressway once and for all — and to offset the cost, introduce tolls. The option has been debated and dismissed by the city before, but it’s time to consider it, Abdulhai said.

“The only way out of this conflict is to bury it, like Boston did,” he said, referring to the herculean effort in the U.S. city to bury a crumbling, elevated expressway.

Benjamin Dachis, a C.D. Howe Institute analyst, agreed it was time to introduce tolls to help pay for maintaining and improving the Gardiner, rather than tearing it down.

“There’s always going to be this instant reaction of, ‘Oh gosh, we shouldn’t be imposing tolls,’” he acknowledged.

But Dachis said there was an “amazing effect” around the world — including in Vancouver, which introduced a toll for its new and improved Port Mann Bridge — where drivers will accept paying a toll if they feel they are getting something better in return.

“If we do this in a way that the situation is better than it is now — and it’s going to cost us money one way or the other — let’s do it in a way that has both the benefit of paying for it,” he said.

Dachis added that tolls also have the effect of reducing congestion, because some drivers will take alternate routes to avoid the cost or turn to public transit.

Architect and urbanist J. Michael Kirkland had a different view. He said the city was wasting its time only considering the stretch east of Jarvis St. and should additionally tear down the section between York St. and Jarvis St.

“The corridor to the waterfront is through the downtown, basically from Jarvis to York, and it’s most important. It’s sort of the civic living room. It’s like having a power pole go through your living room,” he said.

Kirkland said only 20 per cent of the Gardiner’s traffic is through-traffic bypassing downtown. The city would also benefit economically from tearing down that section because it would free up prime waterfront real estate, which would increase the city’s tax base, he said.

“I challenge the people who want to keep it up to tell me: If it wasn’t there, would you want to put it up? The answer is no,” he said.

“Unfortunately, people are sort of used to it. However dreadful it is, it’s sort of there. Its mere existence lends a certain amount of credibility to it.”

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